What is the secret to Becky Foster and her Slenderellas teammates’ 20-pound loss to win the fall round of Lighten up Lenoir?

It’s very simple — moderation.

“We didn’t want to give up anything completely because it would just make you want it that much more,” the Snow Hill resident said Friday. “It was just portion control and balance.”

Lighten Up Lenoir is a weight-loss program sponsored by LenoirMemorialHospital. Participants can form teams or compete as individuals to lose the most weight in a three-month period.

It is free to take part, and participants enter their weights each week online at lightenuplenoir.org.

The final challenge of 2012 ended in mid-December and the first challenge of 2013 begins Jan. 21.

The first-place winners received movie tickets and a free membership to the Minges Wellness Center at LMH.

“We’re pumped up for the next round,” Foster said.

Slenderellas — a play on the fairy tale character Cinderella — includes Foster and fellow Greene County residents Debbie Thompson and Margaret Fisher. Fisher is a Free Press staff writer.

“This time we’re going to be Slenderellas and The Prince,” Foster said.

She said they are working to recruit either her husband or Thompson’s husband.

Foster’s husband, Andrew, was briefly a member of Slenderellas, and still eats healthy and exercises regularly, she said.

Foster said the interest in Lighten Up Lenoir came from a desire to eat healthier.

“We wanted to eat more healthy and we thought, doing it together as a team, we could,” she said.

Foster said she has substituted whole-grain bread and pasta for their white counterparts and eats more in-season fruits and vegetables, as well as healthy sweet snacks such as peanut butter and celery.

She also walks 30 minutes a day. She will walk during her breaks at work, and at the LMH walking track whenever she can get to Kinston.

She also stressed the need to eat breakfast every day.

“The key is to be consistent, have a regular schedule. … If you missed a day, you missed doing it — it made you feel better, it made you feel healthy,” she said.

David Anderson can be reached at 252-559-1077 or David.Anderson@Kinston.com. Follow him on Twitter at DavidFreePress.